Quote:Reading through these posts, it's amazing to me how peoplecan be so unappreciative of experts who have worked foryears to develop their skills. If you've heard of JohnnyMorton, the NFL wide receiver, who tried to fight in theUFL after training in martial arts for 2 months... Hegot knocked out in under 2 minutes.

Imagine if the prop bet was basketball; a chess grandmasteris the chess equivalent of an NBA player ( or maybe evenall-star ) at the worst. The average "good" chess player,( ie less than 1700 rating ) would be analogous to a weekend gym rat who loves basketball.

Would anyone in their right mind bet on the gym rat nomatter HOW good the odds ? ( 10 point handicap to 20,NBA player can only shoot from 3 point land... etc... )

Probably not... unless the NBA player had to play inshowshoes, or blind-folded, or something utterlyridiculous...

Or imagine the gym rat vs. an NFL player, one-on-one,a la those old American Gladiator events. How oftendid the average Joe beat the Gladiator ???

My point is: non-experts tend to completely trivializethe skills of experts in their field to their owndetriment; especially in games of skill or athleticendeavors.

I think that you are missing the point a little. I have played chess while drunk before and beaten a (sober) near GM with a queen handicap. I am sure that I could train myself to win in this situation (with a rook handicap) in less than a week. There is a rating cutoff point in which all players with ratings > X can beat a GM of Curtains' level with > 90% probability. X is almost certainly a lot lower than you think.

A small perturbation in 'game fairness' can only be measured in the context of the game.

For example: I play Garry Kasparov right now with a handicap of bishop, knight, rook on one side of the board: I crush him.

I play Tiger Woods with 4 clubs in his bag that he gets to choose: he absolutely crushes me and I am about a 12 handicap.

I play TLK in HU LHE and only get top 33% hands: I should be a winner.

I play PA in HU LO8 and only get top 33% hands: I probably am a loser.